and therefore he warns his disciples, and in them all Christians to the end of the world, to make it a petition in their prayers upon any approaching calamity, to be delivered from the neceffity of fleeing upon the day when the duties of the Sabbath fhould be observed: Seeing it is no fmall aggravation of our distress to be forced to flee and travel on God's holy day, when we should be employed in attending the folemn ordinances of his worthip, and enjoying communion with

God therein.

VII. A seventh argument may be taken from the abfurdities that would follow upon the denying the morality of this command.. For, then, 1. There would be but nine commands in the moral law, which is directly contrary to fcripture; for we are told that there are ten in it, Deut. x. 4. "And he wrote on the tables, according to the firft writing, the ten commandments, which the Lord spake out of the midst of the fire," &c.

2. It would open a door for atheism and immorality, and tend to caft loofe the whole moral law: For if we yield that the fourth commandment is not moral, but ceremonial; why may not fome, in the next place, rise up and fay, the second and fifth are not moral neither ? and fo on, concerning the rest. But the Lord, having written the whole moral law in tables of stone, and the fourth command in midft thereof, doth teach us thereby, that the whole of it fhould be indelibly written in our hearts, and that the obligation of it, and of this command among the reft, can never be extinguished.

Laftly, The univerfal church have ftill held the commandment of the Sabbath to be moral, and of perpetual obligation, and that the feventh day of our time should be confecrated unto the Lord. The constant practice of all true Chriftans, fince the apoftles times, in obferving a weekly Sabbath, is a great confirmation of this truth; efpecially if we confider, that the judgment and practice of the catholic church have been fo uniform, conftant, and uninterrupted in this matter, that we do not find fo much as one heretick, or perfon of any fort in ancient times, that ever prefumed to oppofe or contradict this doctrine.

And

And as the forefaid univerfal confent evidenceth this truth or law to be of divine inftitution, fo it proves it to be a dictate of the law of nature and found reafon, that one day of the week should be dedicate to the worfhip and fervice of God. Yea, fo ftrong is the light hereof, that those who have apoftatized from the true religion, and have taken up with the vileft of fuperfti tions, have ftill found it neceffary to fix upon a certain day of the week, for the performing of folemn worthip; and fo the Mahometans have chofen Friday for this end, and the Parthians obferved Tuesday: For it is evident to every rational man, that the religious obfervation of a weekly Sabbath is the greatest preservative of a folemn profeffion of religion in the world. Take away from amongst men all confcience of obferving a stated day of facred reft to God, for the celebration of his worfhip in affemblies, and all religion will quickly decay, if not come to nothing in the world. And it is to he obferved, that, wherever religion flourisheth in the pow er of it, there we find moft confcience made in the obfervation of the Sabbath.

Queft. V. If the fourth commandment be moral and perpetual; how then could the Sabbath be changed from the last to the first day of the week, as we fee it done?

Anf. The precife day of the week for the Sabbathi not being of the effence of the fourth commandment, but only an alterable circumftance in it, the actual alteration thereof under the New Teftament makes no more against the morality of the fourth command, than the change of the outward ordinances and means of worship under the gofpel, makes against the morality of the fecond command. That the keeping of the precife feventh day of the week is diftin&t from the fcope and fubftance of the fourth command, which is only to institute one day in feven for the Sabbath, is pretty evident from the command itself, both in the firit and laft words of it. The first words, "Remember the Sab. bath day to keep it holy," do contain the whole fubftance of the command: the last words, "Wherefore the Lord bleffed the Sabbath day and hallowed it," do

contain

contain the formal reason of the command: And in neither of thefe is the feventh day of the week spoke of; which notifies to us, that the obfervation of that precife day is not eff ntial to the moral and ftanding law of the Sabbath, but feparable from it. If it be faid, that the command enforceth the obfervation of this day from God's example in refting upon it; I answer, that a feventh day's reft after fix days labour, is all the conformity which the fourth command requires of us to the example of God, i. e. any feventh day he pleaseth to appoint.

Moreover, our natural reafon argueth for what is above afferted: For though the Jews, who lived in the land of Palestine, might poffibly have observed the precife feventh day from the creation; yet the joint obfer. vation of that precife time was impoffible to all others whom the fourth command doth concern, because of the difference of the climate where they live, which makes it night to many of them, when it was day to the Jews. Again, the computation of our time by weeks, confifting of feven days, each of twenty four hours length, was fo interrupted in the times of Joshua and Hezekiah, by the prodigious lengthening out of fome days, that I cannot fee how the precife feventh day could poffibly be moral, or perpetually binding. From all which I infer, that the change of the day, by inftituting the Lord's day, or firft day Sabbath, in the room of the feventh day Sabbath, doth noways repeal or infringe the morality and substance of the fourth commandment.

Several proper questions may be moved upon this head.

Quest. 1. By what authority came the day for the Sabbath to be changed? Anf. By the fame authority that first appointed the Sabbath, I mean that of our Lord Jefus Chrift, who is true God, "the Lord of the Sabbath," and sovereign Head of his church.

There are indeed fome differences among divines about this matter, fome holding this change to have been made immediately by Christ himself; others, that it was made by the apostles: But both opinions come to one

thing, and equally establish the divine authority of the Lord's day; feeing the apostles were divinely infpired, and infallibly guided by Christ's Spirit, in their ecclefiaftical determinations, delivering nothing to be conftantly observed in God's worthip, but what they had the Lord's authority for, according to 1 Cor. xi. 23.

Athanafius painly affirms, that the change was made by the Lord himself; and indeed it is more than probable, that during Chrift's forty days ftay on earth after his refurrection, wherein he continued inftructing his disciples of the things relating to the gofpel-church, " and giving his commandments to his apoftles," Acts i. 2, 3. he, among other things, appointed this change, leaving it upon his apoftles to make promulgation of it to the world after his afcenfion, and especially at Penticoft, at the extraordinary effufion of the Spirit on that day, whereby he publicly confirmed this charge.

When the facred penman of the book of the Acts tells us, that Chrift continued for fo many days fpace after his refurrection, to fpeak to his apoftles" of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God, ie the gofpel-church; he furely hath a special refpect to the inftructions he gave them concerning the ordinances and inftitutions of the Christian church. And as he inftructed them how they should change the carnal facrifices of beafts into the fpiritual facrifices of prayer and praife, the facrament of circumfion into that of baptifm, and the facrament of the paffover into that of the Lord's fupper; fo likewife he instructed them how to change the feventh-day Sabbath, into that of the Lord's day. All the primitive fathers are very pofitive concerning the-divine authority of this change. Ignatius, who lived in the first century, faith (in his Epift.) concerning the Lord's day,' Omnis Chrifti amator dominicum celebrat diem, reginam et principem dierum omnium.' Auguft. Serm. 151 de tempore, faith, 'Dominicum diem apostoli religiofa folemnitate haben'dum, fanxerunt, quia, in eodem Redemptor nofter 'a mortuis refurrexerit, quique ideo Dominicus appel'latur.

Quest.

1

Qutt. 2. If it be asked, What was the neceffity of this change? I answer it was neceffary,

1. To manifeft Chrift's glory and equality with the Father; for Chrift faith, "That men fhall honour the Son, as they honour the Father," John v. 23. Wherefore, as they honoured the Father with a Sabbath, upon account of his reft from creation; fo it was fit they fhould honour the Son with a Sabbath, upon account of his reft from redemption, which was a far more glorious work: And, therefore, in honour of the Son, the Christian Sabbath is, by the Spirit of God, called the Lord's day.

2. The change of the day was neceffary to manifeft Chrift's headflip over his church, and that he is the fovereign Lord over his own houfe, worship and ordinances; and, particularly, that he is "Lord of the Sabbath," which title he had affumed before in Mark ii. 28. And accordingly he would have this convincingly difplayed to the world, by fhewing that he is able to change the day of his folemn worship.

3. Since he hath thought fit to appoint a new manner of his worship, it was meet to appoint a new time of it also. The Levitical fervice and ceremonial worfhip of the Sabbath day being changed, it was proper the day of the Sabbath fhould be changed alfo, to fhew the more clearly the expiration of that worship, and to induce the Jews the more eafily to lay it afide, and keep Chriftians the more from judaizing.

4. There were fome things in the observation of the feventh day Sabbath peculiar to the Ifraelites, that be. longed properly to that nation, and not to others: As, 1. God defigned it to be a fignal or mark for diftinguifhing that people from the rest of the world; there. fore he calls the keeping of this day," a fign betwixt him and the children of Ifrael, throughout their generations," Exod. xxxi. 13. 17. i. e. a fign they were God's covenanted people, a nation that flood in a pecu liar relation to God, above all others in the world. But, this relation coming at length to be altered, it was fit the fign fhould be alfo changed. 2. When God revived the inflitution of the Sabbath to the Jewish na